As much back story as I can actually give is that she's lived in a kennel for all of her nearly three years of life. She's never been taught how to learn and the only training she received was force based. I've had her since Saturday and I have to say, I'm dang proud of this little red retriever. She's done some really slow/concerned behavior offering since Sunday but today is the first day she's actually given me something like this.

I'm a dork and apparently can't set up my video camera so you can actually see my hands/her head but whenever I stupidly squeal in excitement is when she's stepping up onto the pedestal as an offered behavior, with my hands at my sides.

How is her evaluation and stuff going? Because I think you kinda need each other...

So far, so good. They're setting her up with an experienced foster able to take her out in public. We need to see if she'll ever settle in enough to not startle first. She startles at anything new, watches, and recovers. If she's going to be an assistance dog, she needs to not startle in the first place. Will enough exposure under threshold work? I guess we'll find out.

__________________"If you love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." -- Samuel Adams 1776

"When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty."